'The Mask of Zorro': A film that doesn't insult the intelligence
By Rayya Makarim
JAKARTA (JP): Martin Campbell's The Mask of Zorro is a throwback to the time when stunts and effects in movies were integrated into the story instead of vice versa.
It's an old tale of honor, loyalty, discipline and vengeance. Good must triumph over evil, and blood debts are nursed down through generations. Unlike other modern action pictures which overflow with technical whizbangs, the new Zorro offers us something different.
It demonstrates traditional movie craftsmanship that respects the characters and story, resisting the temptation to simply use them for dialog breaks between action sequences.
The opening scene takes the audience back to 1821 Mexico where the ruthless Don Rafael Montero (Stuart Wilson) rules the land. He randomly chooses peasants to be shot by a firing squad just to lure the mysterious Zorro (Anthony Hopkins) into his snare.
Zorro is aware of this and boldly enters the scene with vigorously choreographed swordplay and acrobatics that haven't been seen in films since the old Errol Flynn swashbuckling adventures. Just as swiftly as he enters, he exits on his horse Tornado, saluting the crowd in his trademark pose: silhouetted against the setting sun.
After what was supposed to be his last public appearance, Zorro, who is really Don Diego de la Vega, returns home to his wife and infant daughter. However, the evil Rafael learns of his real identity and sends guards to Diego's abode.
Diego's beautiful wife is accidentally killed by one of Rafael's men who is immediately slayed by his master, for he also loves her. Rafael then imprisons Diego, and raises his enemy's child as his own.
Twenty years later Diego's child Elena (Catherine Zeta-Jones) has grown into a beautiful woman, and the man she recognizes as her father is back from exile, ready to turn California into a republic. At the same time, her real father, Diego, escapes from prison. He is ready to avenge his wife's death and reclaim his only daughter. But he has grown old in the meantime, and is in serious need of an assistant.
At this point we are reintroduced to Alejandro (Antonio Banderas), a thief on the run who as a child in the opening scene helped Zorro escape from Rafael's trap. Old Zorro decides to pass on his skills to an angry Alejandro who plans revenge on his brother's killer, Captain Harrison Love (Matt Letscher), a Rafael underling.
The Mask of Zorro then embarks on a catalog of regimented training scenes between the retired Zorro and his young protege. These sequences are full of energy and humor. The swordplay is romantic, not ear deafening, and the combatants parry each other's witty dialog while they engage in death-threatening clashes.
At one point, Diego asks whether his student knows how to use a sword. Alejandro casually responds: "Yes. The point goes into the other man."
The team of writers, John Eskow, Ted Elliot, and Terry Rossio treat their screen characters with great care. Hopkins is brilliant, as always, bringing dignity and zeal to a role that otherwise could have easily become too melodramatic. But it is Banderas that will draw most of the women moviegoers.
The Spanish actor's portrayal of Alejandro is a mix of chauvinistic gallantry and comical smugness. In one scene, Alejandro, attempting to prove his skills, enters Rafael's castle to steal a wild horse.
He manages to mount the stallion and with a conceited smile whispers, "We are like one spirit." The next thing we see is a horse throwing his rider onto the stable floor alerting the guards to the intruder's presence.
In an effort to escape, Alejandro whistles to the horse the way his mentor Zorro does. Unfortunately, the horse moves away, and the young man jumping off the roof, once again lands on the ground.
An audience loves seeing arrogance reduced to ridicule. It gives them an illusion of reality where even heroes can be human (well, this one at least).
The characterization of Elena by Zeta-Jones is also amusing. Elena is a ravishing beauty, with wit, a quick sword, and is scantily dressed as often as possible (Ah, how we loathe perfection).
She parries and lunges at Alejandro in an erotic battle of steel, leaving her with just her underwear. When Rafael sees her, Elena pretends to be full of contempt for the masked man who left her half-naked.
She fails miserably as her expression changes into one of a love-sick puppy describing the young rogue with dreamy eyes: "He was young ... (sigh) ... and vigorous." This makes her more human and accessible.
Both Zorros' screen presence is made more effective by the convincing depiction of the villains. Wilson and Letscher play Rafael and Love with a certain iciness that contrasts with the warmth of the two protagonists, a sure way to make us hate them even more.
Zorro is not a pretentious film. It doesn't offer much substance, but it also doesn't give the impression that it is ever going to.
So when Elena is too hasty in believing a stranger that Rafael is not her real father -- we accept. When near the ending Alejandro and Elena (with ripped clothes but without a scratch) walks triumphantly in slow motion, leading a horde of people away from a disaster area -- we say with a smile: "sure, why not".
Campbell, who directed GoldenEye, brings a breath of fresh air into a genre that is dictated by automatic guns and fancy explosives. Instead of the bleak and dark mood that is commonly associated with the superhero genre lately, The Mask of Zorro is fun and more importantly, never takes itself too seriously.
At the end of the film the legend of Zorro lives on. The idea of the "hero" is transformed from the local to the universal as Alejandro walks into the sunset saying, "There must always, always be a Zorro." After all, Zorro is larger than life -- and we wouldn't have it any other way.
The writer is film curator at Teater Utan Kayu, East Jakarta.